


always be your Robin

by tryslora



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Community: fullmoon_ficlet, Gen, Reverse Order Storytelling, Stilinski Family Feels, Superheroes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-23
Updated: 2014-11-23
Packaged: 2018-02-26 18:01:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2661299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tryslora/pseuds/tryslora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What does the sidekick do when his hero is gone?</p>
            </blockquote>





	always be your Robin

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written for fullmoon_ficlet's prompt #95 - Superhero. I’m not even sure where this came from, and I’m sorry about the angst. I’m playing a little with technique to change the flow of emotion in the piece, and I hope it worked (concrit about that is welcome; I like it, but I don't know if others will). As always, I do not own the world or characters of Teen Wolf, I just like to play with them.

Stiles sits on the floor, surrounded by issues of Batman. He has the Dark Knight graphic novel, current issues, old storylines, everything he ever collected with his mother. Together they worked to get a copy of every place Batman appeared in print that they could afford, neatly cataloged and put away.

She would love and hate to see him now. She always insisted that comics were meant to be read, but she also made sure that Stiles knew how to care for them. She taught him to touch them gently, open them with care and read without leaving grease or fingerprints on the pages.

Claudia Stilinski would have sighed to see the collection strewn about on the floor, but right at that moment, Stiles doesn’t _care_. He’s looking for something, and it has to be here.

_It has to be here_.

He no longer reads, simply skimming over the words and familiar plotlines. When his father walks in, Stiles glances up, then back down, flipping through pages.

“Hey, son.” The sheriff crouches down next to him, fitting in between the comics, careful not step on them. Claudia would have been pleased. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Stiles _is_ pleased. These things around him are precious memories.

“You gonna clean these up before bed?” The sheriff asks.

“I can’t.” Stiles drops the one he holds and reaches past his dad for another. “I’m looking for something. I need to find it. I can’t sleep until I find it.”

His dad’s fingers stroke over his hair, the cut buzzed ever since… ever since. Stiles hiccups, and the sheriff’s fingers still at the nape of his neck, soothing. “What are you looking for, son?”

“It’s a story. I can’t remember reading it, but it has to be here.” Stiles flips through the issue in his hand, breathing tight. “It has to be here.”

“What is it?” The sheriff’s voice is low, but it doesn’t soothe Stiles, not now.

“Batman knows how to do everything. He’s the _hero_. But Robin…” Stiles hiccups again, the sound wet, tight in his chest. “There are stories about how Batman felt when his parents died. There’s even a story about what happened to Batman when _Robin_ died. But there’s nothing… I can’t find anything… what does Robin do if Batman’s gone?”

#

“Are you sure?” Claudia holds the razor in her hand, flips the switch to start it buzzing. The sound sends a chill down Stiles’s spine, but he nods as resolutely as he can.

“I’m sure. A good sidekick always supports his hero.” He wraps the sheet around his shoulders so that he won’t end up covered in hair, and sits in the chair with his back to Claudia. “Cut it all off, mom. Then I’ll do yours.”

“Oh, baby.” The buzzing stops and when Claudia sinks down in front of Stiles, he tries to hold back the tears. “It’s not going to be forever, I promise. I’m going to get medication, and I’ll be in the hospital for a little while, and it wil be okay.”

Whenever adults _promise_ , it’s always a big thing. Sometimes they’re telling the truth, and it _will_ get better.

Sometimes they’re lying.

Stiles has seen them lie before, and he doesn’t _think_ his mother would—she’s a _superhero_ after all—but she might. And he can’t trust a promise right now.

Besides, he’s been listening. He knows how to hear things that they don’t want him to hear (how else would he learn anything useful, like the password for the WiFi that they don’t think he knows, or everything about his mother’s illness). They’re letting him believe it’s cancer, that she’s getting chemo, but it isn’t. It’s something else.

It’s something more serious.

He didn’t think something could be _worse_ than cancer, but sometimes you can get better from cancer. He doesn’t think she can get better from this.

“Baby?” She takes his hands in hers. “I need you to be strong. Be my Robin.”

“You be my Batman, and I’ll be your Robin,” he says seriously. “Just remember, Batman always wins.”

“I remember.” She stands up slowly, reaches for the razor again. As she shaves the first line of hair from his head, she murmurs, “Just you remember it too, baby.”

When the sheriff comes home, Stiles is fighting with the razor and Claudia is half bald, and they both have tears running down their cheeks. There is hair everywhere, and they are laughing at the chaos, and Stiles hopes he can remember the laughter forever.

#

Stiles slams the front door with all the force of his seven-year-old hands. It’s heavy enough to thunk loudly, echoing in the entryway of the Stilinski home. He stomps up the stairs, each footstep hard and thudding as much as he can possibly make it, grumbling as he goes.

His mother emerges from the guest room, fabric dangling from her hands as if she’s in the middle of sewing something. It is a bright red, and it _almost_ makes him smile, because it has to be his Halloween costume. “What’s wrong, baby?” she asks.

“Jackson-Stupid-Whittemore,” he grumbles.

“What have we said about name calling?” Claudia says gently. She crouches down, eye to eye with Stiles. “I know you don’t like the Whittemore boy, but—”

“He’s a _doodie-head_!” Stiles bursts out. “He’s _mean_ and he can run fast and he told everyone that I’m a _caterpillar_ because everyone else could win races and I couldn’t. It’s not _fair_. I’m going to be the Flash and he doesn’t even care about superheroes.”

“Well, you can’t possibly be as fast as the Flash when you’re not wearing your costume,” Claudia says with a soft smile. “You have a secret identity, right? Jackson can’t know you’re the Flash. Does he know when you’re Robin?”

Stiles bristles. “Of course he doesn’t. Jackson doesn’t _understand_. He’s just a boring boobie.”

“Names, Stiles.” Claudia’s voice is full of reproach and he droops at the sound.

“I’m sorry, Mommy,” he whispers, and he knows it’s okay again when she runs her hand over his head, fingers teasing soothingly at the wavy strands of hair. “I don’t know what to _do_. I’m smaller than him and he’s such a—” He stops abruptly, eyes wide as she watches him expectantly. Stiles inhales roughly, lets it out in a rush of frustrated words. “He’s such a _Jackson_. He’s mean to Scott, too. I wish you were at my school. It’s not fair that you’re with all the older kids. It would be so much better if we had Batman with _us_. You’d make sure that none of the bullies were mean.”

“I’m just a teacher; I can’t be Batman at school.” Her eyes light up, bright and mischievous and he knows that it means they’re about to play. “I can only be Batman at home, when we’re superheroes together and I have my Robin.” She puts one hand behind his shoulder, nudges him into his room where he can finally drop his backpack and climb up to sit on the bed. She settles in next to him, and he lets her pull him onto her lap, figuring that maybe she needs some cuddles.

He’s a big kid; he doesn’t need the cuddles. Not at all.

She strokes his hair until he lays his head on her shoulder, relaxing into her touch. “So,” she says softly. “What are you going to do tomorrow?”

“About the—” Stiles just barely catches himself before he says _doodie-head_ again. “About Jackson? I don’t know. Maybe… maybe I shouldn’t run with him?”

“Did you want to do races?”

“Everyone does races. It’s what all the boys—and most of the girls— _do_ at recess. Except for a few people because they can’t.” Stiles thinks everyone knows that. It’s like playing tag, or kickball, only they’re just competing with each other.

“What about Scott?”

He hangs his head because she has a point. She has a really big, bright, glowy point and it doesn’t make Stiles feel very good to realize it. “He doesn’t run much. He tries, sometimes, because everyone tries. But then he can’t breathe.”

“What else could you do?”

At first it seems so easy—they could play superheroes. Except Scott doesn’t like comic books, and he doesn’t like talking about things like fighting. People who yell make him nervous, and he won’t talk about why. Stiles worries at his lip, tries to come up with an alternate plan.

The thing is, Stiles _loves_ his comic books. He absolutely _adores_ stories about superheroes who help people.

“Maybe we could make up our own comic?” he suggests. “Maybe we could write something that doesn’t have any fighting, just helping, then Scott would have a comic that he likes. And maybe we could make up gadgets or I could make things and bring them in to play with or tell him about all the cool things that Robin has. Because Robin doesn’t need to be fast because Batman helps him have all the cool toys.”

“That sounds like a good idea, my perfect little sidekick.” She kisses his cheek. “I’m going to get back to work on your Flash costume, and we’ll have dinner in an hour. I’m going to set the timer, so when you hear it go off, promise me you’ll do some super-chores and set the table for me?”

“Always.” Because that’s what Stiles does. He wants to be a superhero just like his mom when he grows up, and he will be, even if right now he’s her sidekick. They’ll work together to keep Beacon Hills safe some day. He’s sure of that.

#

The summer before Stiles starts kindergarten is terrifying. He usually likes summer because it’s the one time when Mommy is home and all _his_ , but _this_ summer he knows that at the end of it, he has to go to _school_ , just like Mommy. Only he won’t go to the same school as Mommy, he’ll go to a different one for baby kids, not the big kids.

He doesn’t like it.

And he doesn’t like the way he keeps being taken to doctors and they make him take stuff that tastes really awful but Mommy says it keeps his mind calm. He doesn’t really know what calm _is_ , but it makes Mommy and Daddy yell less, so that’s okay.

The thing is, he likes his time with Mommy, and he knows he’ll get it again but next summer seems so far away.

He wishes he didn’t know school was coming. Maybe it would have been better if it were a surprise, like birthdays, only icky.

“What do you want to do today, baby?” She picks him up and he wants to tell her _no_ , he’s a big boy, but at the same time, he want to curl close and let her hold him. He stays still for a whole minute before he kisses her cheek with a loud smack, then wiggles to be set down.

“Batman!” he chortles, running into the living room, and she trails after him with a laugh.

Mommy has the best Batman collection _ever_. She has _so many_ DVDs and they watch all different ones. She has comic books too, but she won’t let Stiles look at them without her help yet. Someday, when he can read, she promises that he can look at them by himself, but he has to be careful.

It’s a secret that he hasn’t told her yet, that he can read some things. He recognizes _Batman_ and _Joker_ and _Harley Quinn_ and _Poison Ivy_. He’ll figure out the rest of the words soon.

She puts in a DVD and settles onto the sofa, waiting for him to climb up and cuddle with her while they watch. They go through two episodes of an old animated series—it’s funny to see it, the way the mouths move so strangely—but he loves it, because she loves it.

At the end, when she touches the remote to turn it off, he sighs and puts his head on her shoulder. “You’re a hero, too, Mommy,” he says. “Just like Batman.”

“Maybe I _am_ Batman,” she whispers, touching a finger to her lips. “You can’t tell anyone; it’s a secret.”

He laughs out loud, shaking his head. “You can’t be _Batman_. You’re a girl.”

She purses her lips, brows furrowing as she makes a face at him. “What do you mean, I can’t be Batman? It’s a secret identity! You don’t know that for sure. I told you my secret and you’re laughing at me.”

She sounds really offended. Like maybe she’s telling the truth.

His eyes go wide and he stares at her, and slowly she smiles.

“Are you really Batman?” he whispers, and she nods once, expression approving. And oh, that is just _so cool_ and wait a minute, if Mommy is Batman, then that means… “Am I _Robin_?”

It’s her turn to laugh, and she gathers him in, hugging him tight. “If I’m Batman then you are very right, you are totally Robin, my darling boy.”

He tumbles off the couch, punching the air on the way to the ground and shouting his delight.

He loves the way she smiles at him, the sheer love in her eyes when she touches his head. “If we’re superheroes, that means we have missions,” she says softly, like it’s a secret. “I think that means we need to… super clean the house!”

He agrees, of course, because Robin always does what Batman says, and if saving the world means cleaning, then they’ll take on all the evil, one room at a time.

Stiles’s mom is a superhero, and he will always be her Robin, no matter what.

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to find me, I'm [on tumblr](http://tryslora.tumblr.com)!


End file.
